The Many Faces of the Victim Role

From time to time everyone experiences the feeling of being powerless to life’s challenges.?When you feel powerless there is a good chance you will take on a Victim mentality, believing your hopes and dreams will never come true.

This is the origin of the Victim role—one of the three roles that make up the Dreaded Drama Triangle (DDT).

Personal empowerment grows when you become aware of these patterns and choose to redirect your focus toward the innate goodness of your Creator essence, the foundation of TED* (*The Empowerment Dynamic)?.

The?Victim role?manifests in several unique ways that we call the “many faces of the Victim.”?Each face contains a similar pattern that blames external circumstances or other people for what you don’t like. When mired in these nuanced “faces,” taking responsibility for your choices, rather than blaming external situations, is the key to personal transformation, yet often remains elusive.

It is important to remember that these expressions are defense mechanisms, and do not define who you are. At your core, you will always be a Creator. The hope is to become aware of the repeating patterns, allowing you to recognize and shift to more empowering, and easeful ways of being.

These faces are like actors in a play called Your Life. They are only roles playing their part and not your truest and highest self. Here are a few we’ve noticed:

1. Poor Me
2. When in the “poor me” aspect of the Victim mentality, you may feel justified to complain and want others to join your pity party. You wish for sympathy from others and may become irritated if you don’t get it.
3. Why Me?
4. You believe others are luckier, smarter, prettier, healthier than you. Since you’re not the lucky one, it is easy to give up and see little reason to work hard. You believe things are not your fault—you’re just unlucky—giving rise to a nagging sense of unfulfillment.
5. The Doormat
6. You often let others walk all over you and are willing to submit to the authority and needs of others, hoping for their approval and love in return. You may attract Persecutors who can take advantage of you.
7. The Dummy
8. You believe you are not smart and lack knowledge or intelligence and, therefore, you are entitled to being uninformed, helpless, and even blameless. You are not willing to ask for help for fear you won’t be understood.
9. The Hider
10. You become Victim to your own lack of self-confidence and withdraw or hide your true feelings and creativity. Not wanting to be rejected, you isolate yourself from being visible or seen, while still knowing you have much to offer, producing a cycle of disempowerment.
11. The Chameleon
12. You mold yourself according to what you think others want, therefore your boundaries are very porous. You might say, “just tell me who you want me to be, and I’ll be it,” relinquishing your own creativity and sense of agency.
13. The Miser
14. Mired in a sense of lack and wanting, you ask for special favors and rewards to fill your inner scarcity. Deep down you believe you will never have or be “enough,” sometimes finding it difficult to be grateful for what you do have. A sense of entitlement may take root that masks your inner belief of scarcity.

You may resonate with one or more of these faces, or none. It is possible that you have identified another “face” that is uniquely yours. Either way, it is essential that you appreciate the value these faces have played in your life, otherwise your Inner-Persecutor will be triggered, causing you even more self-criticism.

We cannot change what we do not realize. By illuminating the many ways the Victim role may emerge in your life, you have a choice to transform these patterns and live fully in your?Creator essence.

Remember these characteristics are not who you are. They are simply habits developed over time to protect you. You are a Creator imbued with goodness and unlimited gifts and possibilities. Do you really understand that?